Taking Stock After My Year Away From Racing

It's hard to believe it's already been over a full year since I last raced, or even drove on a racetrack. On Sunday, August 16th, 2025, I raced my last two Gridlife Touring Cup races in my E90 330i. At the time, I had no idea it would be my last hurrah (I sold the car in early 2026).

If you want a refresher on why I took the time off, the article is here:

Why I’m Taking a Break From Racing

The last couple of years have been a wild ride. When the opportunity to compete in Gridlife full-time presented itself, I could not say no: I knew that I would regret it if I did. Racing in GLTC with my closest friends has been nothing short of core memories.

RISING EDGEThomas Lathrop

While I've continued writing about racing, mostly from the same perspective, a lot of thoughts and ideas have come up over the past year that I haven't shared yet. I'll try to cover them here, while doing my best not to ramble. If any of these threads are worth exploring further, please let me know.

The First Few Months

Because of team burnout, we all agreed to skip the last event of the season, which was slated to be the Gridlife season finale at PittRace. Just a few weeks before the event, the news came out that PittRace was being sold. I really liked that track, so it stung that I'd never get to drive it again.

By some time in October, I had figured out that I wanted to step away from racing for a while, for the reasons detailed in my prior article. I posted the car up for sale. It didn't get much serious interest at first, as October probably isn't the best time to sell a somewhat specialized and expensive race car.

October through February actually felt quite normal. That was, after all, the typical off-season, and the perfect time of year for a lot of sim racing. I improved my sim pace and racecraft considerably through practice and highly competitive league racing. It was plenty to scratch my competitive itch.

Spring & The Start of Racing Season

My goal was always to stay involved with club racing as much as I could, even if I wasn't driving. In the springtime, this meant helping out my brother and teammate Carlos Mendez with his GLTC program. I was excited to be back at the track and help on the engineering, data, and mechanical side.

We put in an impressive effort for Gridlife South Carolina in April, only to be stuck outside the top 10 all weekend, despite doing all the right things. It was an unacceptable result, and unfortunately, it sealed the fate of our E90 GLTC cars and the rest of the 2026 GLTC season. Carlos sold his car shortly thereafter.

Gridlife's schedule is very busy and packed between June and August, with events every 3 weeks at some points. It wasn't until that time of year that I really got the itch to be back on track. I certainly missed the excitement and frenetic nature of racing 5 weekends within a ~2-month period, even if it was a tough feat to pull off.

Summer Into Fall – Car Shopping

By June, I was shopping for race cars almost daily. I've inspected some and made multiple offers, but nothing has stuck yet. I am fraught with indecision, mainly because I don't have a clear goal or purpose for the car in mind. I'd like to simply dip my toes into some driving events for now, but I don't know how long that will hold my attention. At the same time, I'm not really sure if I want to race again.

I try to look at things with the end in mind, which logically ends with an ST5 car, since that is the class that all of my friends race. However, I really want to try something more modern with an automatic or DCT gearbox, and those two desires are often at odds. So, I've fully embraced my overthinking persona and have been stuck in a loop for months.

Hindsight Is 20/20

I've had plenty of time to reflect on my two seasons racing in GLTC. While I don't have any regrets about the experience (it was truly incredible), I feel like it was obvious all along that our E90s were not a good fit for the series. At least, not as they were configured.

I really believed I could hone my driving and optimize the car setup to be competitive, but in truth, those tweaks only ever gained tenths, and we needed seconds.

This was never more apparent to me than at Gridlife CMP this spring, when a well-executed team effort and nearly mistake-free driving from Carlos couldn't crack us into the top 10.

Staying Involved

I learned that, with purpose, I enjoy working on race cars, and in particular, detail work without a specific deadline is the most enjoyable. I truly enjoy the engineering side of racing, and I don't get to focus on that much when I am racing myself.

This led to RISING EDGE opening its doors to a long-term project optimizing an S54 E36 build, along with a couple of alignments and corner balancing, and, of course, some weekends hanging out at the track for fun, socialization, and occasionally to help out other racers.

I've even gotten some peeks behind the curtain of professional racing at the IMSA level, thanks to friends who work in the industry. You guys know who you are, and I thank you; it has been such a pleasure. I love seeing how real pros do their job, and trying to relate it to those of us doing it as a hobby.

My mind keeps coming back to the term club race engineering, with club being the operative word. At any level above amateur club racing, race engineering is a vital, pivotal role, but below that, engineering is basically non-existent. Budget is a big reason why, and I get that. I don't think there is a burgeoning market for what I'd like to do in helping others succeed at club racing, but thankfully, I'm in a position where I can do this primarily for the love of the sport.

Deliberate Practice

My favorite non-car-related hobby and coincidental form of exercise is mountain biking. I took it up again in earnest in August 2025, and ever since I've ridden at least 3-4 hours per week over ~3 rides.

Even though I've been riding on two wheels for most of my life (including BMX racing and motocross), it's been eye-opening to realize that even with deliberate practice multiple times a week, it takes a long time to improve my riding skills. And I am not talking about my fitness level, but simply my ability to handle my bike accurately, safely, and stylishly on the trails.

When I'm riding, I'm often pondering the parallels between my riding and my driving. Over almost 3 seasons of wheel-to-wheel racing, I did only about 6 to 10 test days & practices. Many of those were spent solely learning a new-to-me track for the first time, not actually improving my driving skills.

Sim time certainly counts for something, but if I ever get back into racing, I want to make a conscious effort to test and practice more, which will come at the expense of racing less. But, as Ross Bentley says, "Practice does not make perfect. Only the right kind of practice makes perfect (and perfect is questionable)."